By Fayaz Ahmad Ganie on July 28, 2018Comments Off on “Begging” Reflects Collapse of Society’s Associative Relations. Let’s Do our Bit to Stem It

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The instinct of association, in more organized and ordered manner, than the other species, has helped humans to overcome all other enemies and survive the vagaries of nature and the cataclysmic events that took place on the earth. In the associations the roles were, and are, specifically allotted and divided. Each individual in human associations has a definite role and the role is to the advantage of the person concerned and the social groups he belongs to.
Some were engaged, and are engaged, with leadership roles and management of associations, others perform actual activities of a society and nations. These actives help these collective groups to accomplish the individual and collective goals and objectives of humans. This sort of arrangement yields optimum results for human species which are for all to see considering the level of success of human race and the advancement of this species.
To specify the benefits, the life in association with others provides higher levels of security to humans. The associations try to secure a periodic and guaranteed income for their members. They ensure the optimum physical and mental development of the members. Moreover, the intentions of the most of the human associations are to not only provide the members the wherewithal to exist at the subsistence level but to give them an honorable life and sustainable existence. The associations which work this way enable their members to be the real representatives of the supreme of all creations in the real sense. However, there are associations which are certainly the exceptions to the rule. These exceptions are primarily due to various negative tendencies and inclinations in human nature.
So, where there is a generous element in the human nature, there also is one of greed and avarice. The vices of greed and avarice prevent a man to act in a cooperative manner. All he or she is concerned with is to ensure his or her own survival and accumulate as much of material wealth possible. In the process if his fellow beings suffer and face extreme hardships of life, that is not his concern, he bothers not about this. As long as material benefits keep accruing to the greedy persons, nothing else is of and value or interest. Whether other people die they least bother about it. If the greedy get benefited from death, let people die and they work to hasten the occurrence of that death. These sorts of tendencies and inclinations have made relations hostile in many societies and human associations, thereby, giving rise to many adverse issues and problems.
The instincts of greed and avarice leave some people out of benefits of human associations. Nothing of value is left for such people, they are not considered for extending any help towards them, they are left at the mercy of the nature and natural forces. Even these people are not covered in the government schemes and programs to improve their conditions. They are compelled then to live a subhuman level of existence where the normal schedule and scheme of life is broken by such people to exist.
Instead of working these people live by begging for lack of work; instead of having a schedule like all other respectable people do, they are compelled to resort to disgraceful activities of pickpockets and thieves and instead of living at the normal places of human habitations, they are constrained to live in the spaces which are not suited for any human habitations, even animals desist from living in these places. All this means that they are forced to suffer all types of hardships and difficulties; they are left with no other option than to choose all unnatural and illegal means to survive.
Normally no human with a conscience wants to beg or resort to a crime or criminal activities. However, when the options of respectable existence are non-existent what else could they do, they have to beg and they have to live a criminal existence. Any government or social organization can hold a moral high ground only if provisions for these people are made available: if they are included in the governmental schemes, programs and policies. In case that is not done, these associations are morally corrupt and of little use. The better option for the sufferers of this discrimination and cruelty, in a sense, is to leave these associations but that is never an option. The instruments of power at the disposal of the beneficiaries of such associational arrangement never leave that option for anybody; the sufferers have to live there even if in subhuman conditions.
About beggary, the people with no option are justified to beg for they are not allowed to live as the others live. It is the human feeling of compassion and care among many members of societies which give some hope and survival to these people who need genuine help. The compassionate and generous people of human associations are the hope and means which keep the poor beggars living.
That was about the normal way of begging and genuine begging; if begging can be called as genuine. There is another type of begging where people love to gain money without working and where the avaricious members force the disabled and bodily malformed people to beg. Their deformities are used to arouse human feelings of compassion and care towards their fellow beings. They are exploited to the extent where men with conscience feel ashamed of. The wounds of the wounded are like pay cheques for the exploiters, they are cashed and encashed every morning and every evening. These wounds are never allowed to heal.
In the morning they are left at the roadsides, the places of worship and others where there is huge rush of people. The diseased and deformed condition of their bodies and limbs makes people to help them by whatever way possible. Once the day is over the beggars are collected like the sand bags and thrown to the dirty shelters to repeat the cycle the next day. They are never properly fed and clothed; they are never treated as humans.
Little children, women and old aged all are used conveniently and craftily to keep gaining wealth for the exploiters. Begging has become an industry for these people. It is a highly paid industry where there is no investment. The astounding, amazing and painful fact is that all the law enforcing agencies and associations stay mum, the legislators and executives who see this thing happening just outside their offices, and at times within them, never take a step to stop the curse. Begging is illegal by law but it seems that it has gained all the sanction of law.
This way of acting by the law enforcement agencies has created a dictum that ban a thing by law and it will become a common practice in no time. Hence, banning things by law is the easiest thing to do to make things common including begging, especially in our part of the world. Seeing the status of affairs it seems that the legislative, executive and judiciary all over are in connivance to make begging so common that every other person should resort to this practice. None of these institutions, and great institutions of a democratic government, seem worried to stop the menace of begging. The menace instead is growing with each passing day.
Something needs to be done about it and it needs to be done urgently. The people inclusively should raise their voices to deal with the curse of begging. Begging may be highly paying activity but it cannot substitute the satisfaction of human effort. There is nothing painful when you are blamed of living undeservingly upon something which belongs not to you. By whatever way that is done that is not acceptable. Men are humans only when they live like human. They are humans when they never compromise their self respect.
In the current state all the men who compromise their self respect either by trying to avoid honorable work and to get easy bucks by begging or by forcing the differently able and diseased people to beg both fall not in the category of humans as the supreme of all the creations. They are living an existence either of parasites or beasts. As for as those who genuinely need help should be provided that help. The best help for them is to raise their level to an extent where they need no further begging. All have a role to play in this direction.

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